


Divers Alarums

by audiaphilios



Series: From Tumblr With Lo-- [18]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, Original Character(s), Rare Pairings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-20
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-18 16:57:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9394583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audiaphilios/pseuds/audiaphilios
Summary: Dex grows up and moves away. Jamie grows up and waits.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Keezey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keezey/gifts).



> This is entirely thanks to [@dontthinkaboutzimbits](http://www.dontthinkaboutzimbits.tumblr.com) and their amazing OC, Jamie Bittle, Bitty's (huge) little brother. [Go read everything in this tag now.](http://dontthinkaboutzimbits.tumblr.com/search/jamie+bittle)
> 
> Keezey sent me the following prompt:  
> I made up a rare pair, and I'm gonna try bring you to rare pair hell.Mostly in the hope you'll write something.yknow that post about Bitty's brother Jamie?it mentions Dex like, twice. Well, now I ship them. I call it Jamiex!! (Also a mistake but meh)
> 
> My response (with some background for those just joining us):  
> Apologies to @dontthinkaboutzimbits, but I’m going to borrow her character for just a bit on your behalf, @enchantingdefendorperson. Well, I’ll mostly be writing about Dex, but Jamie is just fucking amazing, so I don’t blame you for shipping them at all.
> 
> Now, I want to keep the canon presented in the two posts regarding Jamie Bittle. Which means Dex is in a happy, stable, monogamous relationship with an Unnamed Person through his senior year at Samwell (when Jamie arrives). Jamie himself has a gorgeous college romance with the almost-Broadway star.
> 
> [Originally posted on tumblr July 10, 2016.](http://audiaphilios.tumblr.com/post/147181782325/i-made-up-a-rare-pair-and-im-gonna-try-bring-you)

Besides, what could ever happen between Jamie and Dex? For god’s sake, Dex is the first person that Jamie ever calls Dad. And Dex feels that way, he really does. Even after that really confusing conversation with Coach Bitty--Coach Bittle. Coach. Whatever the fuck Dex is supposed to call the father of his friend  _and_  his (apparent) surrogate child. 

He wonders, during his senior year, if this is what Bitty felt towards Chowder. Then he rethinks that, because as indulgent as the feeling is, Dex is pretty sure it was never so thoroughly blended with exasperated irritation. That part, at least, seems like a Poindexter Original.

&&&

The thing is, Dex communicates best via aggression. That’s his native tongue. It’s why he and Nurse worked so well for so long. It’s just the real world interfered. It’s not that Dex had no appreciation for the arts, but it was one thing to have a boyfriend who was a poet living off of his family money when they were both in college, and had similar priorities: grades, hockey, eating well and working out. Not necessarily in that order.

After graduation, though, Nurse wanted to live in New York and focus on his writing. He wanted Dex to join him. But Dex didn’t spend four years and countless hours becoming a damned fine programmer just to let that go to waste. To Chowder’s blended horror and joy, he and Nurse split amicably and Dex ends up in the Bay Area, working for a Major Corporation. 

His years at the Haus serve him well for the laid-back, liberal, frat-house mentality, and he does really well for himself. Periodically he’ll get texts from Jamie, asking him to borrow his power tools, or telling him to come help with a set. Dex wonders in these moments if Jamie remembers he lives across the country now. He’s fairly sure Jamie’s just touching base, but he does like to, when he has the chance, catch a last-minute flight out and show up with his tools just to see the look on Jamie’s face. 

He doesn’t do it too often, but it’s priceless when it does work out. Besides, he’s always able to make a week or so of it and visit with Jack and Bitty, and occasionally New York. His employer allows him to work remotely, after all, and while he prefers to be hands-on with his projects, sometimes the stars align and he finds himself back on the east coast, enjoying his found family as well as his original one.

Jack and Bitty get married the summer after Jamie’s senior year. Dex hadn’t been a very good Dad the past year or so-- he’s been working hard to get on a particular research & development team, and then spent a solid eight months dedicated to that effort before he realized that he had just a couple weeks after the project launched before the wedding. He called Bitty to reassure himself that he’d RSVPed, and heaved a sigh of relief when Bitty promised they’d saved him a place. 

“For your plus one, as well!” Dex could hear Bitty smiling across the miles, but Dex had a moment of befuddlement. Had it really been three years since he and Nurse split? Christ, when was the last time Dex had sex with someone other than himself? When was the last time it was less perfunctory than a handshake followed by a sneeze?

With that horrifying image in mind, he snapped back to the conversation.

“Oh, um, no. No plus one.”

“Oh! I’m sorry, I thought-- Jamie said that you’d  _gotten_   _busy_ , and you know how he phrases things sometimes, he’s a funny one, that boy, and I...anyway, we definitely have your seat saved!” Bitty is just as graceful at segues as he’s ever been. Which is to say, not at all.

Dex, for his part, feels even worse thinking about Jamie than he did thinking about his masturbatory habits. He feels like he should call, or text, or something, but the wedding’s in ten days and, like many things, Dex prefers to apologize in person.

&&&

The thing is, Dex communicates best via aggression. And Jamie was the most aggressively  _gay_  person Dex had ever met. Before Samwell, Dex didn’t have much to go on in the way of community or experience, and so it took him a while to adapt, and even longer to unpack his internalized bullshit. Bitty was the first gay man Dex spent time around--well, back before he’d realized that’s what he’d been doing alone all this time-- and Bitty was not aggressive in the least. Well, passive-aggressive, but while Bitty was pretty obviously gay, [he also fainted the first time Dex skated towards him at a practice](http://67.media.tumblr.com/7e1237dc4b6f39cf42db5fd0a21398a2/tumblr_ndrbvnjvQU1szaospo9_r1_1280.jpg). 

Jamie, however, went beyond even what he’d learned during his years at Samwell. He was, physically, so  _not at all_ gay, and then personality-wise he was a like a sledgehammer of homosexuality.  _But is it gay enough?_ seemed to be his life motto, and after the years he’d spent just trying to get used to being in a relationship with a man, being a man who liked  _men_ , seeing someone that young, and that comfortable...

He made Dex feel wrong-footed, like he was a freshman all over again. Dex looked at Jamie and it felt like seeing a different version of himself. After all, they were both tall, broad men, not outwardly “gay-looking”, not campy or flamboyant or any of those things Dex grew up thinking gay men were or had to be. Well, at least till Jamie opened his mouth. Either way, he still defied stereotypes. 

During Dex’s senior year, Jamie’s arrival actually gave him courage that he’d lacked up until that point, even though he and Nurse had been together and out-at-Samwell for over a year at that point. Jamie was aggressive in a way Dex understood. Jamie was aggressively himself, and despite the way Dex put his foot in his mouth numerous times that first year, he knows they developed a pretty solid friendship.

So he really shouldn’t feel torn between guilt and the urge to drag the little shit out back and punch some sense into him if he doesn’t stop  _aggressively ignoring_ Dex at Jack and Bitty’s reception. Part of him feels like he deserves it, but the only thing that’s really holding him back is the fact that it might ruin Bitty and Jack’s big day if the grooms’ brother and their guest get in a fistfight over a failure to keep in touch.

It doesn’t help that Nursey’s laughing at him.

“You are clearly in the shithouse with Jams, there. That’s the third time he’s walked by and offered to refresh my drink-- though I’m clearly still in the fury splashzone if that last ‘Bless your heart’ was any indication. Maybe I should go find someone else to talk to.”

“Shut the fuck up, Nurse. I’ll figure out a way to sort this out.”

Nurse laughs, and Dex glares.

“No offense, Dexy, but you’re shit at conflict resolution. You’ve been scratching at your wrists like you wanna take your gloves off for ten minutes now.”

“What the--I’m not even wearing gloves.”

“Exactly my point.”

This time, Dex reverses the order of the glare and the “Shut the fuck up.”

Dex catches Bitty’s eye and tilts his head towards the door to the reception hall’s kitchen. Bitty looks almost relieved, though he’s not sure if it’s because of his obvious situation, or Bitty’s desire to escape conversation with Ransom’s plus-one. Dex has to admit, as much as he likes Holster’s boyfriend John, it seems Ransom never recovered from the blow. As far as Dex can tell, his girlfriends just get taller and blonder, in all senses of the word.

Dex wonders, briefly, if anyone’s talked to Ransom about it, but he decides he’s got his own situation to deal with at the moment. Not that he and Jamie are anything like Holster and Ransom, of course, but there’s still a conflict he’s determined to resolve, Nurse’s chirping be damned.

&&&

“You didn’t even text him?! Dex, I am so disappointed in you.”

Dex is groveling to the wrong person, he knows this, but he’s been conditioned to respond to Bitty’s disappointed-mom tone.

“Look, I forgot he wasn’t a part of the SMH chat! I hardly had time to look in on you guys from time to time, let alone catch up with what had been said since the last time I looked! I wouldn’t have even seen Chowder if he didn’t show up at my apartment with food, and he lives in the same building!”

“You can’t just forget your friends, William James Poindexter. No matter how busy you were!”

“You didn’t even realize I hadn’t spoken to him--”

“It’s not my business to know that! And I am just madder than spit that you would think so. Lord, when I think about how hurt my baby brother must have been, especially if he had no idea why you’d disappeared! No wonder he thought you’d gotten a boyfriend, lord, it’s not like he could ask me if I’d heard from you! What would he have felt like if I’d had to fill him in!”

Bitty’s face is red, and there are tears in his eyes, but Dex knows that this isn’t what sadness looks like on Bitty’s face. This is disappointed-mom-gets-frustrated-and-angry.

Dex’s first language may be aggression, but he’s honestly in fear of his life right now.

He’s almost relieved when the door flies open, and Jamie stands there panting. 

“Dicky don’t you dare tell him!”

“Jamie I would never--!”

“Tell me what?”

Bitty’s face has returned to its normal color, but Jamie’s has taken up its flag. Bitty removes himself with all the delicacy his segues lack, and then it’s just Jamie and Dex, standing alone in the kitchen, looking at each other. Dex notes that he’s grown his hair out a bit, his mop of blond cowlicks are now half-curled, slowly being tamed by their own weight. He’s just a big and broad as Dex remembers, but his face has thinned some, and his jaw broadened, and Dex remembers belatedly that he missed Jamie’s graduation two months ago.

“Fuck, Jamie. I’m so sorry. For everything. I didn’t mean...” he trails off, uncertain of where he was going. “I missed a lot.”

“Didn’t seem like you _missed_ anything.”

That stings, because Dex doesn’t think it’s true, but he can see how it seems that way.

“I was--”

“Don’t say you were busy.”

Dex sighs. 

“Look. I.” He sighs again, scratching at his wrists like they’d have an easier answer. “What did I miss?”

“Do you want that in chronological order or order of importance?”

“Either. Both.”

Jamie shifts his weight, eyes glancing up and to the left as though consulting the script.

“Jason broke up with me. I starred in my first major short film. I had my heart broken. I graduated.”

Dex is quiet for a moment.

“I’m sorry, congratulations, where can I find him to break his legs, and I’m so proud of you.”

Jamie snorts, and Dex risks a small grin.

“To be honest, I’m surprised being broken up with ranked higher than the short film.”

“That was chronological order.”

“But-- okay.” Dex reconsiders the list. “Alright, where do I find the guy whose legs need broken?”

“Dex...” Jamie shakes his head, the flush returning.

“Shit, I’m not even Dad anymore. I really fucked this up, didn’t I?”

The blush is back in full force. 

“You were never really like a dad to me, Dex.”

“I don’t know, I still wanna break that guy’s legs.”

“I know the feeling. I kinda wanna break Derek’s legs.”

Dex abruptly, horribly, sees red. He thinks about how smug Nurse had seemed earlier.

“Oh you’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.” He’s pulling at his cuffs now, halfway to the door, when Jamie stops him by wrapping his arms around his waist from behind.

“No, no no no no no, Dex, that’s not-- that’s not what I meant at all, Dex. Dex--Will!”

Dex had managed to drag him all of one step, but Jamie is much more solid than Dex these days. He practically wraps himself around Dex, huffing in his ear with laughter while trying to encourage him to breathe.

Just as abruptly as the rage came on, Dex realizes this sick red feeling isn’t anger but jealousy. That sucks the adrenaline right out of him, and he nearly collapses. Jamie’s arms are still wrapped around him, practically holding him up, and Dex hates how suddenly he wants this. He tries to forget that impulse and focus on breathing, but every intake presses their bodies closer together. 

It takes more than a few moments for Dex to gather himself. He’s still sagging a bit back into Jamie’s arms when he tries to apologize again. Jamie just squeezes him a bit, but relaxes his hold quickly. Not enough to let Dex go, or even turn around, but it’s kind of better this way. Dex doesn’t have to see Jamie’s face as he realizes what an itchy trigger-finger Dex’s temper has. 

Dex sighs, and hears it echoed by the man behind him. He feels a pressure on his shoulder, and realizes that Jamie’s resting his forehead there.

Jamie speaks softly, into the space between their bodies.

“Okay, I’m going to say something, and then I’ll let you go and you can walk straight out the door, okay? I just.” Jamie takes a deep breath. “I was jealous. Of Derek. Because you guys were really cozy and I know you used to be together and I was jealous of him, okay? I really. I really missed you. Because you’re not like a dad at all, Dex. In fact, that would be kind of terrible in a number of House of Yes kinds of ways. I am saying this in the worst possible way, oh my god. This is what scripts are for, to keep me from making a fool of myself, god, okay, I’m letting go of you know and you can walk away and I’m so sorry but I really, really like you and all of this got out of hand okay letting go in three, two, one...”

Jamie lets him go. 

Dex doesn’t walk away.

Jamie, confused, puts his arms around Dex again, and lets go again, arms spread wide as though releasing a bird.

Dex turns around.

Jamie is looking down those couple of inches at him, a bit baffled.

Dex puts a hand on his cheek, tilts Jamie’s face and his own head, and fits their lips together. Softly, chastely. Appropriate for a first time, for a wedding day, for a new beginning.

Jamie might whimper, just a bit.

Now it’s Dex with his arms around Jamie, and he pulls back briefly from their kiss.

“We’re going to have to talk about this. A lot. Make up for all the talking we haven’t done, okay? Because. Well. Yes. We need to figure--”

And this time Jamie’s the one who kisses him.

It’s just aggressive enough for Dex to understand the agreement behind it.

 


End file.
